12.25.2008

A Very Merry Christmas to You

I'm making this a yearly thing:

I've posted this for the past two Christmases, but again, I say it's worth posting again: The First Noel, a small Golden Book illustrated by the brilliant husband-wife team of Alice and Martin Provensen, 1959.

Hi Ward. A belated holiday's greeting to you and your family. Again, a great post. I collect the Provenson's work and was unaware of this book until you first posted it a few years ago. I went searching for a copy and eventually got one on Ebay. Terrific stuff and I agree with you- a career high point. It would be interesting to have a discussion about career ebb's and flows. I had to cut down on my book collection a few years back which forced me to take a hard look at the merit of keeping this or that and found myself taking note of periods in a artists output that did less for me then others. I kept almost all of the early Provenson material - from about 1948 thru to the early - mid sixties. Kept Fairy tales from 1972 and as well the Glorious Flight. I'm a completest so it was hard but again I found having a collection that spanned a particular artists career over decades literally spread out in front of you gave rise to thinking about again, the evolution of there work and what examples spoke to me more then others.